Regions

EUROPE - Northern Trust Global Investments has appointed Kelly Young as a portfolio manager in its global quantitative management team, which currently has more than US$187bn in funds under management.

GLOBAL - Rising oil prices are exacerbating pension funding deficits at multinational pension plans, with benchmark plans in all the world's leading economies experiencing a fall in their funded status in the third quarter of 2004 - except for Australia...

EUROPE - Almost two thirds of European companies support a new international accounting standard, which demands that corporates expense employee share options in their financial statements, according to poll by Mercer Human Resource Consulting.

EUROPE - Dutch, UK and Nordic institutions are demonstrating the highest take up of hedge fund investment as interest in the alternative asset class continues to rise, according to a new survey on European institutions' alternative investment.

EUROPE - Axa Investment Managers is to bring the first European real estate ETF (exchange traded fund) onto the Euronext Paris exchange next Thursday, 2 December.

BENELUX - SEI Investments Europe has appointed Jeroen Van Rooij as institutional sales director for the Benelux region.

GLOBAL - Baring Asset Management has been split and sold to two US companies for an estimated £300m.

EUROPE - Royal Dutch/Shell Group pension fund will realise a reduction in net assets of US$4.9bn when the IFRS reporting standards come into effect in January 2005.

GLOBAL - Global real estate adviser Jones Lang LaSalle has appointed Christine Bartlett as Australian chief executive officer.

EUROPE - Schroders has appointed Hans Goossens as country head of Benelux.